The inner and the outer,
Are dissolving fast in space.
The ominous clouds of thunder,
Are covering your face.
The meek the mild and innocent,
Are trampled under feet,
As we go one marching blindly,
To our invincible defeat.
No more calling softly,
No more calling you,
We've lost our hope and loving,
What once we thought was true.
And now the choice is coming,
Riding on a wave,
To be a free man dying,
Or be a mad man's slave.
And now the drums are drumming,
Drumming down the line,
Will you be marching forwards?
Will you be deaf and blind?
Will the light of sacred meaning?
Shine from bottom of your heart?
As the soldiers go on marching,
Tearing our humanity apart.
more at http://labyrinthoflies.com

The Women
(for the countless women, names unknown, who bore the brunt of Apartheid, and who fought the racist system at great cost to themselves and their families, and for my mother, Zubeida Moolla)
Pregnant, your husband on the run,
your daughter, a child, a few years old,
they hauled you in, these brutish men,
into the bowels of Apartheid's racist hell.
They wanted information, you gave them nothing,
these savage men, who skin happened to be lighter,
and white was right in South Africa back then,
but, you did not cower, you stood resolute,
you, my mother, faced them down, their power,
their 'racial superiority', their taunts, their threats.
You, my mother, would not, could not break,
You stood firm, you stood tall.
You, like the countless mothers did not break, did not fall.
You told me many things, of the pains, the struggles,
the scraping for scraps, the desolation of separation
from your beloved Tasneem and your beloved Azad,
my elder sister and brother, whom I could not grow
up with, your beloved children separated by time, by place,
by monstrous Apartheid, by brutish men,
whose skin just happened to be lighter.
You told me many things, as I grew older,
of the years in exile, of the winters that grew ever colder.
You were a fighter, for a just cause,
like countless other South African women,
you sacrificed much, you suffered the pangs,
of memories that cut into your bone, your marrow,
you resisted a system, an ideology, brutal and callous and narrow.
Yes, you lived to see freedom arrive, yet you suffered still,
a family torn apart, and struggling to rebuild a life,
all the while, nursing a void, that nothing could ever fill.
I salute you, mother, as I salute the nameless mothers,
the countless sisters, daughters, women of this land,
who fought, sacrificing it all for taking a moral stand.
I salute you, my mother, and though you have passed,
your body interred in your beloved South African soil,
you shall remain, within me, an ever-present reminder,
of the cost of freedom, the struggles, the hunger, the toil.
I salute you!
(for the brave women of South Africa, of all colours,
who fought against racial discrimination and Apartheid)

The Nameless
Slipping through the sieve of history,
the nameless rest.
Not for the nameless are roads renamed, nor monuments built.
Not for the nameless are songs sung, nor ink spilled.
The nameless rest.
Their silent sacrifice,
quiet ordeal,
muted trauma,
remain interred,
amongst their remains.
The nameless rest.
Not for the nameless are doctorates conferred, nor eulogies recited.
Not for the nameless are honours bestowed, nor homages directed.
The nameless rest.
They rest within us,
they walk with us,
in every step that we tread.
They rest within us,
they walk with us,
for their spirit is not dead.
“Your name is unknown, your deed is immortal”
- inscription at The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier WWII in Moscow
Special thanks to my dearest elder sister Tasneem Nobandla Moolla, whose conversations with me about life as a non-white person growing up in pre and post-Apartheid South Africa prompted me to write this dedication to the countless, nameless South Africans of every colour, whose sacrifices and dedication in the struggle against Apartheid tyranny must never be forgotten.
My sister’s middle name ‘Nobandla’ which is an isiXhosa name and means “she who is of the people” was given by her godfather, Nelson Mandela, my father’s ‘best-man who could not be, as Nelson Mandela was unable to-make it to my parent’s wedding as he was in jail at the time in the old Johannesburg Fort. This was the 31st December 1961.

The Petty Posh-Wahzee - Liberation & Ostentation
The Not-So Distant Past:
The fallen fighters for freedom, are unable to turn in their graves,
their battered, fragmented bones, mixed with a handful of torn rags,
are all that remain, a mute reminder of their selfless valiant sacrifice.
They endured brutal Apartheid harassment, detentions without trial,
torture in the cells, and mental anguish when loved ones disappeared,
they left their homeland, to continue the struggle against racial bigotry,
while countless others fought the scourge of white-minority rule at home.
Nelson Mandela and many, many others, spent their lives imprisoned,
on islands of stone, and on islands of the cruellest torture, yet they stood,
never bowing, never scraping, they stood, firm for ideals for which they were prepared to die,
and many, many comrades did die, at the hands of the callous oppressor,
and many, many comrades perished in distant lands, torn from their homes,
while the struggle continued, for decades, soaked in blood, in tears, in pain.
The Present:
19 years have passed, since freedom was secured at the highest of prices,
delivering unto us, this present, a gift of emancipation from servitude,
a freedom to walk this land, head held high, no longer second-class citizens,
in the land of our ancestors, whose voices we hear and need to heed today.
I do not care much for fashion, Lewis-Fit-On and Sleeves unSt.-Moron,
yet the ostentation that I witness baffles even my unsophisticated palate,
our ancestors' plaintive whispers are being dismissed, left unheeded, as
we browse the aisles for more and more, always for more and yet more.
Asphyxiated by the excess of the Petty Posh-Wahzee, we find ourselves,
perched precariously on the edge, of a dissolution of all that is humane,
babies go hungry, wives are battered, our elders left in hospitals for hours,
I cringe as I scribble these words, perhaps too sanctimonious and preachy,
yet I know, deep in the marrow of my brittle bones, I know, I know, I know,
this tree of freedom planted by the nameless daughters and sons of Africa,
needs to be shielded, nurtured, protected from our very own baser impulses,
so that the precious tree of freedom, may bear the fruit that may feed us all,
for if not, then we are doomed, to tip over, and into the yawning abyss, we shall fall.

The Seeds of Acceptable Hate
Between the folds of faith and belief,
tucked neatly in cushioned corners,
lie the seeds of acceptable hate.
Through quaint pleasant rituals,
and joyously hummed words,
dumbed down thoughts
and dazed faces exude,
righteous sweetness.
Belief wrapped in glistening foil,
faith painted in gaudy colours,
concealing the murmurs of hate,
of embraced intolerance,
and welcomed bigotry.
The seeds of acceptable hate flourish in damp fungal minds,
as indifference flowers into the silence of frozen apathy,
with blooming petals of finely measured howls of rage.
All the while the ever smiling faces beam with deep pride,
drenched in all the pious tears they've cried.
And so it is that the viral seeds of acceptable hate
thrive among the genteel folk that quietly gaze,
in silence at the slow creeping of the horror.
As more seeds of hate are sown with manic zeal,
and in the shrieking of this cowardly silence,
the seeds of acceptable hate,
continue to thrive,
and to germinate.

Note: Every year the government sets aside a Day of Remembrance for the
Holocaust. This year it is the first week of May. Please share this with everyone so
that none of us or our children ever forget.
They rounded us up one day in the rain
Herded us into a cattle-car train
We were just Jews, it was simple and plain
The pain – we must always remember
When the train stopped there were so many dead
Ushered into two groups, tears were all shed
Weak ones culled out and away they were led
That said – we must always remember
None of this ever has made any sense
Staying alive in good health our defense
We'd spend every day praying out by the fence
Consequence – we must always remember
At night we would gather and in silence we pray
Pray that we make it through one more day
What tomorrow would bring – no one could say
Today – we must always remember
Each morning we’d line up; they’d walk down the rows
Deciding who lives; deciding who goes
Each morning we’d pray that we weren’t one of those
God knows – we must always remember
And the stench in the camp from the ovens by noon
Reminded us all of our impending doom
Relief from this hell-hole could not come too soon
Repugn – we must always remember
There were thousands of us left back in the damp
In our bunks, in the ovens, or the cattle-car ramps
And surviving this ordeal left its own stamps
The camps – we must always remember
So each year we gather on Remembrance Day
To honor the loved ones who have passed away
And the horrible price that they had to pay
We pray – we will always remember

Fake in this city everyone takes. Money,Greed and sin indeed a ground were
Satan surely breeds, This generation is raised to understand that Hollywood is
the land of promise and plan the beautiful people that see life as so very simple
as though their way of life is America's new temple. The big homes and nice cars
a scar of success their all better than the rest i mean really are we to worship
fake breast.
So my name is not on some walk of fame or my life displayed on freeze frame,
hey that's the price of fame oh you feel violated when some one sticks a camera
in your face and you take them to court and swear you have a case.
America don't conform to some Hollywood taste its just a waste what we
sacrifice for them so they can be some big Hollywood gem and make millions of
dollars for them. Right now i'am going to go out on a limb, i say all Hollywood is...
is one big toilet to piss in never should any one inspire to go to Hollywood and
build some fairytale empire along side these chump entertainers for higher.
America we must set our standards higher put out this raging Hollywood fire the
need for a positive influence is dire.